Contact

Dr. Rayalam is the recipient of the first ‘Virbac Animal Health - Soloxine Award’
for her work on feline thyrotropin during her doctoral program and is a Morris Animal
Foundation Fellow. Before joining PCOM, Dr. Rayalam worked as a research faculty in
the Dept. of Animal and Dairy Science at the University of Georgia. Her major research
interests are in the fields of obesity, post-menopausal osteoporosis and phytochemicals.
Dr. Rayalam has authored/co-authored over 30 articles published in peer-reviewed journals
and contributed several chapters to the text/reference books for DVM and graduate
students. Her work on phytochemicals and obesity is patented and has been cited in
several magazines including Women’s World.

Teaching has always been a passion for Dr. Rayalam. She primarily teaches physiology
and pathophysiology to first-year PharmD students and is also involved in teaching
multiple courses across the PharmD curriculum.

Courses

Research

Dr. Rayalam has worked in the areas of obesity, body weight regulation, phytochemicals
and adipocyte biochemistry for over 8 years. Her research interests include:

1) to study the adipocyte life cycle and to understand the interaction of adipocytes
with other cell types as an approach to address several problems associated with obesity;

2) to develop novel treatment strategies for obesity by inducing transdifferentiation
of white to beige adipocytes and to inhibit lipid accumulation in white adipocytes;
and

3) to identify combinations of phytochemicals and vitamins that have synergistic anti-adipogenic
effects with an ultimate goal of developing pharmaceuticals or nutraceuticals for
prevention and treatment of obesity and associated disorders. Aging is accompanied
by an accumulation of adipocytes in bone marrow and Dr. Rayalam's other interest is
to understand the fat-bone interaction and to identify molecular targets for the prevention
of weight gain and bone loss associated with aging. Dr. Rayalam collaborates with
UGA to develop novel therapies for obesity and osteoporosis.